Trance-Endence
by MikeJaffa
Summary: Originally published on SSBBS under "MikeJoe:" Harper dies when the tesseractor doesn't work. Then things get worse.


TITLE: Trance-Endence

AUTHOR: MikeJaffa; originally published on Slipstream Bulleting Board System under the name "MikeJoe"

SYNOPSIS: Harper dies when the tesseractor doesn't work; then things get worse.

SPOILERS: "Ouroboros"

DISCLAIMER: GRA is owned by Tribune, and that includes the rights to the dialog from "Ouroborus," written by RHW; I am having fun and this came and I hope no one sues me.

A/N: In the original posting, I said this came to me in a dream. 12 years later, I don't remember what part of this I dreamed. But it had to have been one of my more productive naps. And I had to change some things to accommodate FF's document manager.

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"_To those who want second chances, __I say, would you have learned enough from your first chance __not to make the same mistakes?"_

**-The Anointed of the Way, Commentaries and Meditations, compiled CY 10,021**

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/CY 10,093/

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"Welcome to Terrazed," Beka Valentine said, "last bolt hole of the Systems Commonwealth, and in just as good a shape." The cyborged woman with orange hair and a bionic right eye smirked at the irony.

Trance Gemini leaned on the railing above the *Eureka Maru's* pilot's station. "Where's the *Andromeda*?" the gold-skinned woman asked.

Beka's human eye rolled around, looking at things only she could see, digesting information directly from the *Maru's* computers. "All around us."

"What!?"

"The debris field in orbit, that's all that's left of Rommie. Terrazed's in not much better shape; looks like the Magog used some nuclear bonfires for their cookouts. Looks like we came all this way for nothing, Trance."

Trance looked over Beka's shoulder at the ruined planet below, looked really hard. "No. We haven't. Let me take

the controls."

Beka got up from her chair and turned to face her last remaining crew member. "Trance - "

"Beka, *please.*"

Beka looked into Trance's eyes for a moment, then nodded. Trance came down the steps, strapped herself into the pilot's chair, and worked the controls. Terrazed - what was left of it - got closer.

"Know something I don't?" Beka said.

"I know what we want is down there," Trance answered, not taking her eyes off her piloting. "And maybe a one-in-a-million desperate chance to set things right."

"Oh, really? One of those again? Wonder where you got that from? Ah, what the hell, why not?"

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/CY 10,088/

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The purple-skinned girl with blonde hair and pain where her tail had once been, her hair drawn back like the dreadlocks her adult self would one day sport, poked the dirt in the planter listlessly with a small shovel and tried to think of something to do next. She couldn't. She'd come down to hydroponics in the hope working with her plants would ease the pain, but it wouldn't. Nothing would.

Harper was dead.

Harper, Hohne, and Rakeeb had finished Harper's tesseractor with barely minutes to spare before the Magog larvae in his stomach hatched ...and it hadn't worked. It had drawn power and fired a beam at Harper and done nothing.

That had been it, the end, the last chance. Now only one way to stop the Magog from hatching.

The tear-filled goodbyes were still fresh in Trance's mind. Even Tyr had cried profusely... and had kept on crying when he'd shoved the knife into Harper's heart.

Trance heard footsteps behind her. She turned to see Rommie, the *Andromeda's* beautiful android avatar, coming into the room.

"Rommie?" Trance asked, standing and turning to face her. "What is it?"

"I... " The android hesitated in her tracks. "I just wanted to see if you... " Seemingly dazed, Rommie wandered over to Trance, eyes unfocused, seeing and not seeing. "Trance, I... I'm sorry, I know what Harper... what h-h-heeee muh-muh-meant tuh-tuh... " Her face twisted and she started to cry. " ...tooooo... " She couldn't go on; Trance knew what was coming, and could feel it in herself, too. She pulled the android to her and they cried on each other's shoulders, their long, heaving sobs echoing in the room.

"It'll - it'll be ok," Trance finally managed.

"Will it?" Rommie squeaked.

"I... I hope so," Trance said.

They finally disengaged, still sniffling.

"I just... " Rommie said. "I don't understand it. I've always tried to do my best, to do my duty, but they keep dying. They always die..." Her tears increased again.

"You did your best, Rommie," Trance said. "No one could have done more for Harper than you did."

"I didn't do enough."

"You tried, Rommie. Sometimes, that's enough."

"I hope so; it's just... it's like part of me is gone now... Now that Harper's dead, I feel dead, too."

Trance didn't know what to say to that, but events spared her that awkward moment.

"All hands to command," the ship's voice - Rommie's voice - said.

"What is it?" Trance asked.

"Hohne," Rommie said. "He says he's figured out what went wrong... "

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Hohne looked uncomfortable as he looked down at the flexie in his hands, the gaze of the *Andromeda's* four remaining crew and its A. I. bearing down on him.

"Yes, um... " he said. "It appears that the theory was sound and the execution was flawless. But the device was incomplete."

"Incomplete?" Tyr asked.

"Yes," Hohne said. "Apparently, for the string rotations to be successful, another device, for lack of a better term a 'quantum resonator,' must be fitted to the ship's slipstream drive and activated... uh, this is where it gets confusing... five years after the tesseractor is used."

"Time is factor in these equations," Rommie said, sounding dispirited.

"And the resonator would create some odd disruptions in space/time," Hohne added. "Quite excite..." his voice trailed off.

Dylan inhaled. "Thank you, Director. We'll be in touch."

"Yes... um, sorry, Captain. All of Sinti shares in your grief." With that, Hohne went up the ramp and left the command center.

"Is that it?" Beka asked.

"You heard Hohne," Dylan said. "If the tesseractor didn't work, it's because the resonator won't be built. Harper is dead. Nothing can change that."

"Yeah."

"Andromeda," Dylan said. "Status of Harper's remains."

The main A. I. appeared on a big screen. "Harper's body has been sterilized and cremated per Magog Protocols. Awaiting orders for the disposition of the remains." The main A. I. was the most logical aspect of Andromeda, but she had always had emotion in her voice. Now, she sounded numb. It was enough to break Trance's heart... if it hadn't been shattered already.

"Yeah," Beka said, strolling over to the beautiful android with glistening blue hair Harper had created. "Rommie, you went to Earth with Harper. Does he still have family there? Anyone at all?"

"As far as I know, no," Rommie answered. "His cousin Brendan was his last living relative and he is probably dead. We are Harper's only family."

"I would say that you are," Tyr said. "You are probably the closest thing to progeny he would ever... " His voice broke; he turned away.

"Rommie," Dylan said gently. "What do you think we should do with Harper's remains... ?"

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The waves crashed onto the beach at Empress' Point, Harper's favorite surfing spot on Infinity Atoll. Trance thought it odd that it was sunny; it should be dark and cloudy, even rainy.

Rommie had clutched Harper's urn from the moment they had left the *Andromeda,* refusing to let it go. She and Dylan - who hadn't shaved in two days - were a little ways apart from the others. Trance couldn't tell if they were arguing or just talking; she wasn't that good at reading body language to begin with, and grief had messed everything up. But she knew something was wrong.

Finally, Rommie and Dylan joined the others. Rommie didn't look at anyone, just looked at the ocean, holding the urn to her.

"I'm ready," she said finally. She walked to the water's edge, stepping out far enough for the waves to come up to her ankles, and paused. Then she started walking again.

And Trance realized what was wrong.

"NO!" Trance surged forward, splashing after Rommie. "No! Rommie, stop! Please, don't do this." The water was up to her knees when she caught up to the avatar and grabbed her shoulder. "Please, Rommie!"

Rommie stopped in her tracks and turned to face the purple pixie. She didn't look sad for the first time in days; if anything, she had a slight smile on her face. Trance couldn't tell - and would never figure out - if the android was at peace or insane.

"I'm sorry, Trance," Rommie said. "I have to go with Harper. I need him, and he needs me. I have to protect him."

"No - "

"Trance," Dylan's voice broke in. Trance turned to see him standing at the water's edge, a firm and unreadable look on his face.

Trance turned back to Rommie and that... that smile. She started to cry. "No, Rommie, please -"

"It's ok, Trance. I have to go, but I'm not really leaving you. This is just an avatar, a peripheral body to be used and discarded. I will always be with you as long as you walk my decks."

"No... Rommm-eeeeee... "

"Goodbye." Rommie leaned over and kissed the purple girl's cheek. "It was an honor to have served with you."

Then Rommie turned and resumed her march into the ocean. Her pace never slackened even as the waves crashed into her and the water got deeper. Trance stayed put, watching until the top of Rommie's head vanished beneath the water; stayed there for a half an hour after the others had gone up the beach, waiting, hoping that Rommie had come to her senses and would come back.

It didn't happen.

Rommie was gone.

And the *Andromeda Ascendant* would never build another humanoid avatar.

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/SIX MONTHS LATER/

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Trance switched off the welder and pushed the safety goggles onto her forehead. "How was that?" she asked.

The main A. I. appeared on the conduit's monitor. "Very good, Trance. You've improved greatly over the past

months. Pretty soon, you'll be as good as - Well, you'll be very... You're doing well."

"Rommie... It's ok. I miss him, too."

"But are you still... does it still hurt?"

"Not as much as it once did, but a little, yeah. But it does get a little better every day."

"It's just... I think it's because my memories don't dim with time. I don't know. It still hurts."

"You and Harper were close."

"Very close, Trance - not physically intimate, but he was closer than anyone who'd been aboard before."

"That's why it hurts."

"And is that why you still hurt?"

"No." Trance sat back against the conduit wall. "I mourn not just who he was, but who he could have been. I can see all those possibilities; I know what he probably would have been doing right now had he lived. All of that is gone... but life goes on. It has to, Rommie."

The A. I. smiled slightly - very slightly - for the first time in months. "Thank you, Trance. I guess I needed to talk - " She broke off, eyes searching as she digested new information. "Hohne has ended his closed-door meeting with Dylan and is leaving the ship."

"That was fast," Trance said, surprised.

"Dylan wants all hands to report to command. Any 'signs,' Trance?"

"Only that it's not good."

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"What!?" Beka yelped. "No, Dylan - they can't do that - "

"Of course they can," the *Andromeda's* bearded captain (who had actually spruced himself up a little for Hohne's visit) said. "One of the basic principles of the Commonwealth is freedom of choice. I'd be the biggest hypocrite for three galaxies if I didn't respect that."

"Did Hohne say why?" Beka asked.

"He said there were several factions on Sinti who were having second thoughts about participating in 'my' war."

"It's *their* war, too; I don't think the Magog are going to pass them by because their chins are too hard to bite on."

"Nevertheless, I respect their opinions."

"Ok, I'll talk to the chin - "

"No."

Beka stared at Dylan, agape, for several seconds, before she could talk calmly. "Ok, Dylan - let me lay it out for you. This whole 'Restore the Commonwealth' deal has two selling points. One - the *Andromeda;* two - the tacit endorsement of the members who've already signed on. *No one* would have taken you seriously if the Persieds hadn't been the first to sign on, and if they pull out, how long do you think the others will stay in?"

Dylan shrugged. "But they have freedom of choice, too."

"What is with you!?" Beka demanded. "Good lord, it's like you've given up - "

"You have freedom of choice too, Beka. No one is forcing you to stay."

"Fine."

Watching from the sidelines with Tyr, Trance took some comfort from the knowledge that Beka wouldn't leave right away.

But she also knew it was only a matter of time ...

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Within a matter of weeks, Beka was proven right. One after another, the other Commonwealth signatories sent Dylan their regrets and pulled out of both the charter and his mutual defense pact. He didn't make a move to stop them.

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"Entering Terrazed space," Beka said as the slipstream flight backrest retracted from behind her. Trance stiffened at the engineering station; it was going to get bad *now.*

"Very well," Dylan said. "Andromeda, open a secure channel - "

"Wait a minute," Beka said. "Before you scurry off to your cabin, mind tellin' me what we're doing here? If you're going to try and re-restart the Commonwealth, this is a kind of out-of-the-way place to do it."

"I don't have to explain my motives to you; Captain's prerogative."

"And I want to know what this crew - what's left of it - is going to be risking its butt for. First officer's prerogative."

"Fine. It is my intention to put the *Andromeda* at the disposal of Terrazed's Home Guard. Andromeda and I will beef up their planetary defenses, in anticipation of the Magog attack."

"What good will that do? They tore Rommie to pieces both times she met the Magog World Ship; do you really think - " Beka broke off and took a long, hard look at Dylan. "Oh, I get it."

"Get what, Beka?"

"This isn't about Terrazed, Dylan. This is about you. You gave up after you lost Rommie, and now you just want to run away and hide."

"That will be all, Captain Valentine." Dylan was nose-to-nose with her in two quick steps.

"Things got a little rougher than you expected, and you want to hide under the bed like a scared little boy!" Beka shot back. "Well, guess what, mister? It's a hard universe out there, and you either get back up when they knock you down or they run you over. Show a little weakness and it's all over."

"*I said, that will be all.*"

"'All'? I haven't even started - "

Dylan slapped Beka. Once. Hard.

Neither Tyr nor Trance could say anything.

Beka's chest heaved as she glared into Dylan's eyes.

"C'mon, Trance," Beka said quietly. "We're leaving."

"Beka - " Trance said.

"No buts. Tyr?"

Tyr looked at Beka for a moment, almost said something, then looked away.

"Fine," Beka said.

Trance left her station and followed Beka through the big entrance to the bridge, which closed behind them when they were gone.

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/CY 10,093/

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Trance lead the way through the ruined city. The buildings had all been shattered, only concrete and steel skeletons remaining; the ground crunched under her feet and there was no sign of life, as if anything could grow under the dark, tortured sky. Beka had said there were still people around, but so far, they hadn't seen anyone.

"Trance... " Beka said.

"We're almost there, Beka," Trance answered.

"Where?"

"Where we have to be."

Beka stopped in her tracks. "Ok! I'm not taking one more step until I get a straight answer."

Trance turned and walked back to her old friend. "Beka, please, trust me - "

"To do what?"

"To give us all a second chance."

"Us. Defeat the Magog and the Kalderans. In one swoop."

"Something like that. Hey, you said - "

"Advance and be recognized!" A reedy voice shouted from up ahead. Both women turned to see a two meter tall skeleton of a man stagger out from behind a brick wall ahead of them, barely able to hold the deployed force lance he aimed at them. He had ragged white hair and beard to match, a tattered black uniform hanging on his body. Yet something in his eyes, something in his voice was familiar.

Trance smiled and took a half step forward. "Dylan - "

"Halt!" the wreck who had been Dylan Hunt shouted; despite the difficulty, the force lance didn't waiver. "Identify yourselves."

"Dylan, it's us," Trance said calmly, smiling. "It's Trance and Beka. We've come back."

Dylan shook his head. "No - no - you're not Trance and Beka," he said, agitated. "I remember Trance and Beka. Beka was blonde and beautiful, not cyborg. I hate cyborgs. And Trance was purple. You're not purple. So *who are you?*"

"Dylan," Trance said softly, "remember when you were captured and taken to Mobius?" She shuffled forward. "They tortured you and tried to make you confess to their version of what you did there 300 years ago. I found you and helped you escape. Remember?"

"No - no - you couldn't know that - no one but Rommie and Trance knew - "

"You wanted to kill their leader, the Great Compass. I stopped you." She stopped with the force lance almost touching her breastbone. "You let Venitri go. He became an architect again."

"How... how..." Dylan's eyes seemed to clear. "Trance? It really is you?"

"Yes." Still smiling, she reached up and put her hand on the force lance. "I've come back, Dylan, Beka and me both." She gently turned the force lance away from her, slowly prying it from Dylan's hands.

"Trance, I..." Tears welled in the wizened man's eyes. "All gone, all gone now..." He started to cry.

Trance put her arm around his shoulder and drew him close; she could feel his bones under his rags as he cried on her shoulder.

"It's ok," she said as Beka came over to join them. "It's ok, Dylan, we're together again and everything will be ok..."

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Trance and Beka followed Dylan down the steps into the basement of one of the demolished buildings where he fumbled with some keys, unlocking and opening a heavy steel door. He reached in and flipped a switch; the room lit up.

"Where do you get the power?" Beka asked.

"Underground," Dylan said. "Emergency geothermal station. Come in! Come in!"

Apart from having four walls and a roof, the bare, concrete room had little to go for it. Dylan's 'living area' was a little pile of... *stuff* around a sleeping bag next to an electric space heater. Trance was drawn to the nearby crates. She poked her hand into one of them and pulled out a small orange package.

"Emergency rations?" she said. "Dylan, you must have enough here - "

"To feed an army for six months," he said.

"But what about - ?"

"The others? The people out there? I'd share, Trance. I'd share, yes I would. But they don't want to share. They want to kill me and take it all." He rubbed his lower abdomen. "So I don't share. And all this will keep me alive for... "

"Six months, max," Beka said, her body's sensors seeing into Dylan. "I'm reading massive organ failures and cancers sprouting all over the place."

"Oh!" Something of Dylan's old smile spread on the wizened face. "Is that why I feel like hell all the time?" he said as he sat down on his sleeping bag.

"I'm sorry," Beka said.

"Don't be. I should be sorry. I *am* sorry. Should have listened, but no, you were right. Running away, I was running away ... "

Beka knelt by what was left of the *Andromeda's* captain. "I'm sorry, too. I should have been more supportive after Rommie ... I shouldn't have been as rough as I was." She clasped Dylan's wrist. "I guess there's enough stupidity to go around."

Dylan put his other hand over Beka's. "Water under the bridge, Captain Valentine. Let's - let's speak no more of it. So, what brings you to fair Terrazed?"

Trance knelt next to Beka. "We came here for your help, Dylan," she said.

"My... "

"His... "

"...help!?" Beka and Dylan yelped.

"Yes," Trance said. "Dylan, we saw what was left of Rommie. Did she have time to eject any of her emergency memory archives?"

"Yes. Several."

"And you have one of them, don't you?"

Dylan nodded.

"I'd like to have it," Trance said.

"Why?" Dylan asked.

"Yes, why?" Beka said.

"Because it might have Hohne's notes on the quantum resonator," Trance said.

"That Harper's gizmo needed," Dylan said. "You think you can save Harper?"

"Well, yes... " Trance said, surprised that she hadn't thought of that. But if her plan worked, Harper would live... or at least, not die when he did.

Harper would live...

"But that's not the important thing," Trance went on. "Hohne said the resonator and the tesseractor would create space/time disruptions. I can enhance that effect and use it to go back into the past. I can help Dylan's past self at the critical junctures and *maybe* avert everything that's happened since then."

"Trance... " Beka said. "It won't work! We were there. The tesseractor fired and nothing happened - *nothing!* I'm sure I'd've remembered if another you had shown up out of nowhere and we had two Trances aboard. It didn't happen so it won't happen."

"Beka's right," Dylan said. "We were there. Harper died, Rommie... We can't change the past."

"*You* can't change it," Trance said, "but maybe *I* can."

"How?" Beka asked.

"My people... " Trance explained. "We don't have the same relationship with Time you have. We can... move around in it, under the right circumstances, and do things you can't. Even try to change the past."

"Oh?" Beka said. "Ever hear of one of your people pulling this off before?"

"Once, a long time ago - in M86."

"Oh. The galaxy the Magog World Ship destroyed before heading our way. That makes me feel a lot better."

"I didn't say this was a sure thing!" Trance said. "And I didn't say it would be easy. In fact, it will be extremely dangerous. But we've already lost this time around. We don't have anything left to lose."

"Your call, Dylan."

Dylan looked into Trance's eyes for a long moment. Then he spun to one of his piles and rooted through it, pulling out a small box which he opened with a key from his pocket. It contained a small metal cylinder, maybe thirty centimeters long and as wide as his hand. He turned back to Trance, holding the cylinder, but when she reached for it, he clutched it to him. "Take me with you."

"What - ?" Trance said.

"Those are my terms," Dylan said. "You want Rommie's records, you take me with you."

"Dylan," Trance said, "if you go with us - "

"I could be killed?" Dylan answered. "You heard Beka - I'm already dying. I will not stay here and slowly rot. I will die on my feet, with a lance in my hand, fighting to the end." He drew himself up, as if the man they had known had temporarily refilled his emaciated frame. "Do we have a deal?"

Trance smiled. "Of course we do, Dylan. I wouldn't have it any other way."

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Dylan smiled at himself in the mirror. The clean clothes Beka had given him weren't an exact fit - he was so thin, nothing was, really - but between getting cleaned up and the nanobots Trance had injected him with, he felt better than he had in... he didn't know how long.

"If anyone's interested, we're 20 minutes from slipstream range," Beka said as she entered the *Maru's* crew area. She saw Dylan, stopped, and smiled. "Well, well, you look almost human again."

"Thank you, Captain Valentine."

Beka smiled... for a moment, then it faded. "Uh, Dylan... in all the excitement, I forgot to ask... "

"About Tyr?"

Beka nodded.

"He was in command of the *Andromeda,*" Dylan said. "They both fought to the end. You would have been proud."

The intercom beeped. "Guys - come up front!" Trance's voice said, sounding excited. "You won't believe what I've found."

Dylan followed Beka to the cockpit, where they found Trance hovering at the edge of a holographic schematic that almost completely filled the space.

"She did it," Trance said.

"Who did what?" Beka asked.

"Rommie," Trance replied. "She found Hohne's notes and designed two versions of the resonator, one for her own slipstream drive and one for the *Maru's.* And Dylan, she left a message for you."

"Let's hear it," Dylan said.

Trance tabbed some controls, and one of Rommie's holograms - a recording of an image - appeared, facing her old captain.

"Hello Dylan," Rommie said from the grave. "If you are playing this recording, you have found my designs for the quantum resonator. I know, the odds are it will never accomplish its task, but still, I beg you, do not erase these files.

"You once asked me if I believed in fate. At the time, I said I took comfort from the idea that the Universe is a big preprogrammed machine; now... Mr. Harper was annoying, undisciplined, chauvinistic, arrogant, egotistical, and any female who considered him an ideal mate would probably need to have her head examined. But he was my engineer... he gave me life. Since he's been gone, I've never felt more like a soulless machine. In fact, if you are my heart, Dylan, then Harper was my soul. A living thing can't be alive without its soul... "

Andromeda squeezed her eyes shut, pausing for a second.

"If there is a chance," she went on, "any chance at all, please, try to build the resonator. Even if it doesn't succeed, you once told Beka that all that matters in life is that we try. I ask only that you act on those words.

"Goodbye, Captain, and... Good hunting." She looked as if she'd wanted to say more, but thought better of it.

She saluted.

And vanished.

Tears dribbled down Dylan's cheeks; it was a long time before he could speak.

"Trance... are you sure you can do this?" Dylan asked, his voice breaking.

Trance shrugged. "But you heard Rommie; the important thing is that we try. And we have nothing left to lose."

"What's the word, Dylan?" Beka asked.

Dylan wiped the tears away and straightened. "The only words that have ever mattered, Beka: Let's bring it."

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"Now entering the Gehena system," Beka said as the *Maru* rattled into normal space. "Just in time for the ever-popular monsoon season."

"That won't make for an easy landing," Dylan said. "Is this really the best choice?"

"Well, apart from being one of the few friendly ports left," Beka said, "it's one of the few ports left period. And far enough off both the Magog and Kalderan patrol routes that neither will probably bother us."

"Very well," Dylan said; "take us in. Trance? Can I have a word with you... ?"

Trance followed Dylan back to the bunk area and watched as he rummaged through one of his duffle bags. "What is it, Dylan?"

"I've thought about it, and I want you to have this, assuming I can find - ah! Here we are." He turned around and she could see what he was holding - a golden force lance.

"They gave this to Andromeda in recognition for her centuries of service," Dylan said. "She gave it to me as a... memento when I turned command over to Tyr. And I - "

"No, Dylan - "

"It's fully charged and loaded and everything, just gold. I think that color suits you, now." He smiled.

"No, Dylan, I can't accept it - "

"Trance. Please. Humor your old captain, for old times' sake." The smile broadened. "That's an order."

Trance found herself smiling back. "Very well. I accept."

She took the force lance from him and hefted it; good balance. She tabbed a stud and it deployed to its full two meter length. She gripped it near the middle and tried a few swings. As Dylan had said, its color was the only thing to distinguish it from most force lances.

She retracted it and dropped it into a hip pocket. "Thank you, Dylan. I... " Her voice broke. "I won't let you or Rommie down."

"I know you won't, Trance. I know you won't."

/

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Beka identified an airfield where the monsoons were not quite so intense and decided to land there. The descent was uneventful apart from the turbulence... and the fact that Dylan had lost his "aerospace legs" during his time on Terrazed. He got air sick and didn't make it to the latrine in time.

"Well, that's one way to get some color around the place," Beka quipped.

"Hey!" Trance protested. "Gold isn't a color?"

"One color; I like more than one."

After they landed, Trance and Dylan got to work building the resonator and fitting it to the slipstream drive. Despite his poor health, Dylan was still good with tools, and he was impressed with the technical skill Trance displayed. He told her so.

"Well, I did get a lot of practice on the *Andromeda* after Harper died," Trance said.

"Yes, you did," Dylan answered. "I wonder why I didn't notice?"

"Maybe you had something else on your mind?"

Dylan just nodded.

They had the resonator finished in a matter of hours.

"There," Trance said. "Now all we have to do is go forward and calibrate the EM flow."

They'd got as far as the airlock/galley/bunk area junction when Trance stopped in her tracks. "No. I do not believe this!"

"What - ?" Dylan then heard a familiar screech. "Kalderans? I thought they weren't supposed to come here?"

"Anybody tell them that?"

Then they heard a thumping and scraping at the airlock. Dylan got to cover behind the bunk area door and drew his force lance. "You start the resonator! I'll hold them off."

Trance darted forward and tabbed codes into her engineering station as quickly as she could; the slipstream engine rumbled to life. When she started back, she saw the Kalderans had forced the airlock doors and were firing at Dylan's position. He returned fire. They retreated, and then... maybe adrenaline got the better of him, and he forgot how infirm he'd become, but Dylan let out a battle cry and began to charge for the airlock.

"No!" Trance shouted. "Dylan - "

Two more Kalderans popped out from outside the airlock door, firing at the thin, frail human warrior...

And hit him in the chest. Again and again, sparks flying from his front and his back.

But Dylan kept running forward, arms and legs flailing wildly. He plowed into the two Kalderans and knocked them out the hatch. Then Trance pounced on the door controls, sealing the airlock's inner and outer hatches.

She already knew it was too late to save Dylan.

But he had died the way he'd wanted to - with a lance in his hand, fighting to the end.

/

/

/CY _Not Applicable_/

/

/

Beka Valentine, the *Eureka Maru's* blonde captain and pilot, shot the Kalderan chasing Trance and jumped off the ladder from cargo pod. "Trance! You will never guess who I just met."

"A scary futuristic version of yourself?" The purple-skinned girl pointed aft, towards the engine room. "She went that way."

Beka had just begun to turn when a dead Kalderan fell at her feet, a force-lance wound smoking in its chest. Then she lifted her eyes to the engine room.

The woman Trance had pointed at had her back to them, but she was dressed in leather with purple dreadlocks. The clang of metal on metal rang through the freighter. She decapitated the Kalderan she'd been fighting, but another popped up in front her; she disabled it with a kick... and a third dropped down a ladder behind her. The woman did an impossible back flip to land behind it and shot it with what looked like a gold force lance.

Then the woman spun around and faced them. Her face was the same as Trance's but the skin was gold... and more than that was different...

"Behind you!" She fired her lance; Beka heard the effector wiz between her and... her purple Trance. A Kalderan who'd been sneaking up behind them fell dead.

Beka turned back to their... their savior, she guessed. "Trance!?" She couldn't believe it. The same face, the same voice, but everything else... everything else...

The newcomer took a few steps forward. "Beka!" she said with a smile. "I'd forgot how beautiful you were."

"Uh... thanks."

Then Beka's Trance rushed forward to face ... Gold Trance.

"You're me... " Purple Trance said. "From the future."

"More or less," Gold Trance said.

"Did everything turn out the way it was supposed to?"

"No, things are bad, and they're getting worse; I made a lot of mistakes."

"So are we going to lose?"

"At best, we're not going to win." The gold woman touched the purple girl's arm. "You know what we have to do."

Purple gave a small nod. "Is it the only way?"

Gold dropped her hand. "There is one perfect possible future, but I have not seen it yet."

Beka raised her hand. "Uhm, could someone provide me with a translation, please?"

Trance - her sweet, mysterious, purple Trance - smiled at her nervously. "Beka, I have to go. But don't worry, I'm not really leaving, just... changing. Everything will be ok; you'll see."

Then the purple skinned girl named Trance turned and walked towards the aft bulkhead...

...blue light flashed around her...

...and she was gone.

And the gold skinned woman named Trance who was left in her place would curse herself for the rest of her life for what she'd done.

/

/

/

/

Getting Beka to go along with her was a lot harder than Trance had expected, although she shouldn't have been surprised. This Beka had never seen her... mature, instead watching her friend of many years vanish. But in the end - after Beka had threatened her - she led her old friend through the tesseract jumps until they found Harper and Rekeeb in a corridor.

But where was Hohne? Trance didn't like the looks of this.

"Harper!" Beka called. She rushed to her engineer and embraced him. "Thank God; I was worried sick."

Trance stepped forward. "Harper."

Harper pulled away from Beka - and immediately leveled his gun at Trance. Then he recognized her. "Trance!?"

"It's me," Trance said. "It's just a new me."

Harper's eyes flicked to Beka. "What - ?"

"Temporal mechanics give me a headache," Beka said, pushing down Harper's gun.

"Tell me about it - AAAGGGHHH!" Harper clutched at his stomach, almost doubling over; they could hear the chatter of the Magog Larvae in his abdomen.

"One more like that," Harper said, "and I'm going to be the father of six baby Magog."

"Follow me," Trance said.

"Follow you?" Harper protested. "We don't even know you."

Trance got nose-to-nose with Harper. Seeing him again, on the day when she'd seen him die... somehow it was disappointing. He looked and sounded the same as she remembered, but seemed different somehow, smaller, pettier, all his flaws in stark relief.

And she was in no mood for his garbage.

"I'm still Trance," she said. "And if you'd like to get out of here alive, I suggest you do as I say."

/

/

/

/

In the machine shop, Trance learned what had happened to Hohne - he had died while trying to navigate the space/time distortions that the tesseractor would create.

But it soon became obvious that if the machine were destroyed before it could be activated, Hohne would live again...

...and Harper would die.

At the last, as Harper drew his gun and leveled it at the tesseractor, Trance hoped she hid her feelings as the memories came flooding back: the tear-filled goodbyes, especially from herself and Rommie; Tyr not hiding his tears as he stabbed Harper through the heart; Rommie and her crying on each others' shoulders in hydroponics; the insane/peaceful smile on Rommie's face as, clutching her engineer's urn, she walked into an ocean and didn't come out...

And suddenly, Trance didn't give a damn about the reasons she had come back in time.

When Harper turned to Tyr, to thank him for promising to kill him, Trance made her move and hit the activation switch. Harper turned back to the machine just in time to see it fire its beam. But this time, it didn't touch him ineffectually; this time, Harper was lifted off the floor and froze in mid-air; the Magog larvae phased through his stomach and were vaporized; and Harper almost floated down, Dylan and Beka catching him as he fell.

"There," Trance said, "that's better."

"Trance?" Rommie said as she and Tyr leveled their weapons at her.

"What have you done?" Dylan asked.

"I saved Harper's life," she answered.

/

/

/CY 10,088/

/

/

The gold-skinned woman knelt on the floor in hydroponics, by the planter where her younger, purple self, in a past no one else remembered, had come for comfort after watching her best friend die. Trance had... returned here for much the same reason, to find comfort in something familiar. But as familiar as this place and its plants were, it was also strange, as if that life had belonged to a completely different person.

She imagined the rest of the crew felt the same way about her.

"Trance?"

Trance turned to see Rommie coming towards her, but warily, watching, instead of grief-stricken. Trance got to her feet to face her. "Yes, Rommie?"

"Dylan would like to see you on the obs deck at your convenience."

"Of course. I'll be right there. How's Harper doing?"

"Resting. I'll have to run some more blood tests, but there's no trace of the Magog. His inside are still scarred up, but he'll be all right."

"That's good. How are you doing, Rommie?"

Rommie seemed to be taken aback by the question. "I'm... well."

"Relieved?"

"Yes," Rommie said, hesitantly, "more than you know."

Trance hazarded a smile. "I'm glad, and you should be too, Rommie. Y'see? They don't always die."

Rommie was surprised. "What... How did you... "

"A conversation we've yet to have," Trance said.

/

/

/

/

"...So tell me how does saving Harper and losing Hohne do that?" Dylan asked. "How does that set things right?"

Trance thought about what to tell Dylan. On the one hand, Hohne's death had complicated something that was already a mess; the rumblings on Sinti to pull out of the Commonwealth had already started and might accelerate. Trance hadn't anticipated anything like this.

But on the other hand, they had not suffered the losses of Harper and Rommie and the effect Rommie's loss would have had on Dylan. Maybe that would tip the odds in their favor...

Enough to tip the balance?

"I don't know if it does," Trance said. "To tell you the truth, I didn't save Harper to change the past or the future. For all I know, I made things worse."

"Then why?" Dylan pressed.

"For the one reason that does matter," Trance said: "Because Hohne is a stranger and Harper is my friend."

THE... BEGINNING...


End file.
